There was one particular kid, a boy who's father wasn't around, who was a particularly spoiled brat. He always insisted on getting his way. If any of the other kids disagreed, he would threaten them. The threats were never violent; he'd threaten to withhold some favor from them.
The day that stands out in my mind was shortly before his 5th(6th?) birthday. He wanted to play one game, the other boys wanted to play a different game. Boy #1 said, "If you don't do what I want, you can't come to my birthday party.
That was the day I realized I knew God, and he was a five year old brat.
Thus began my departure from Christianity.
I had always been agnostic, from the age of four. I came home from Sunday School one week, crying because nothing made sense. None of the stories added up, and a lot of them contradicted each other. "Mom, how can I know that God is real?" There is no answer to that question that can stand up against the most cursory scrutiny, even if the person doing the scrutinizing is four.
A couple of decades of study and introspection didn't make things more clear.
I spent some time identifying myself as a pagan, but I was pagan in a way that made other pagans twitch and run for the stake and kerosene. It was a fairly pathetic solipsist pantheistic multi-theism masquerading as religion. "I'm god, you're god, this is god, that's god, all that groks is god." It sounds good to a hippy, but it doesn't come with any answers, just questions and BS.
I'm still most likely to identify myself and an agnostic pagan, just to make people twitch.
Now, I'm hesitant about making the jump into atheism. My religious philosophy can best be summed up as:
I don't know who's cranking, but I hope he doesn't stop.
Whether he's natural laws, Jehovah, midichlorians, or the Great Green ArkleSiezure, I just want him to keep on keepin' on.
Proselytes, stay away. I have no urge to be converted.
Besides, as I told the Mormon kids playing missionary on my doorstep, I'm set.
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